How To Read Wine Labels

When I was 21, I took a girl to a fancy French restaurant in a swanky part of town for what was my first real, bona fide date. I was the man or so I thought, as I pulled up to her big house in my silver Chevy Beretta with Jodeci blasting on the radio. With my hair moussed up and my best silk shirt on, I was the epitome of false adolescent confidence.

But she fell for it and the night went well. The shtick worked. That is, until it was time to order a bottle of wine. In my mind, it was a simple process. Something along the lines of, "Garçon, your best bottle of Chateau des something." to which he would reply, "The '87?" to which I would quickly mumble, "Yeah, that'll work. And hurry up, my date's thirsty."

i tried to wing it

First of all, besides having no clue about what to order with filet mignon (my dish) and duck (hers), I couldn't even decipher the darn wine list. It was a mess of terms I had absolutely no familiarity with. I had some sense of reds and whites, but the way this menu was laid out, I couldn't even tell which wines were red or white, let alone what the grape or country of origin was.

I ended up choosing a bottle that wouldn't leave me broke and left it at that. When the sommelier came along to take my order, I tried to conceal my inexperience. The old man was on to me but my date was oblivious. I would have preferred it the other way around.

When the bottle was held up for me to inspect, I realized it was the first time I had really looked at a label up close. It was like an alien language. I knew that the label was supposed to impart valuable information about the wine but I didn't know where to start. What was it telling me? I just nodded in approval and let the man pour.

I hate to feel ignorant as a rule, so right then and there, I made a vow to enlighten myself on wine just enough to get by in a fancy joint like the one I was in. Hey, if you bring a beautiful woman to a classy place, you need to whip some tricks out of your bag. This was my logic at the time.